Carroll County (VA) Supervisors poised to say NO to Industrial Scale Wind Turbines

Carroll will develop windmill ordinance for review
Reposted with permission by Allen Worrell
Editor Carroll News (Va)

Following a motion by David Hutchins, the Carroll County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted Monday for County Attorney Jim Cornwell to develop a draft ordinance for review by January to protect the county’s ridgetops.

Windmills became a hot topic in Carroll County during an April 9 meeting when supervisor Bob Martin said a company from Texas was proposing to place windmills on Stoots Mountain. Multiple landowners have been approached by representatives of EDP Renewables/Horizon Wind Energy about a potential wind energy project, sparking much debate in Carroll County.

Since that time, the county held a public hearing in August regarding windmills and formed a committee to study them. After listening to a recommendation from the Windmill Committee and hearing comments from three citizens, Sulphur Springs District Supervisor David Hutchins made the motion for the board develop a draft ordinance for review by its January 2013 meeting.

With Stoots Mountain being in his district, Hutchins said he spoke to several people from that area at the Carroll County Agricultural Fair in August. None of them were interested in windmills. Hutchins said he thought the board needed to develop an ordinance that would stand up to scrutiny and be defensible, and also that would treat everyone fair.

He then made a motion for the county attorney to develop a draft ordinance for review by the board’s January meeting to protect the county’s ridgetops. Hutchins added that possibly Cornwell could have an ordinance draft ready by December for the board to sink its teeth into and digest before moving forward. Martin seconded the motion.

Cornwell said he would like a feeling from the board of whether they would like him to draft a regulatory ordinance or a prohibitory ordinance.

“I want to prohibit them,” Martin said of windmills.

When no other supervisor chimed in, Cornwell said it sounded like he had a consensus. The board then voted unanimously to approve Hutchins’ motion.

Citizen Rodger Jennings noted from the crowd that Cornwell has already written a similar type of ordinance for Floyd County. If it wouldn’t be a conflict of interest, Jennings suggested that Cornwell may already have something that addresses structures that affect communities.

“Actually it is to your economic benefit,” Cornwell said. “The only thing I see is we don’t have landuse controls, but we do have a statute. I’ll work it as best as I can.”

Following a meeting of the Windmill Committee on Thursday, Supervisor Joshua Hendrick delivered the board of supervisors the committee’s recommendation Monday night that led up to Hutchins’ motion.

“From all forms of public input received, more people have spoken out in opposition of a utility-scale windmill project in Carroll County than those who are in support,” Hendrick said. “Reasons for opposition to a utility-scale windmill project ranged from environmental impacts, landscape preservation, to potential health risks.”

Hendrick said information gathered has led the Windmill Committee to believe the largest benefit for the general public of Carroll County for hosting a utility-scale windmill project would be the monies collected through machine and tool taxes. Estimates of such monies have not been verified, however, Hendrick sad.

“The Windmill Committee is of the opinion that a utility-scale windmill project will not be overly beneficial to the general public of Carroll County; that a decision as to how to proceed be determined in a timely manner; and that the decision to be made contains elements that warrants complete involvement by the Board of Supervisors,” Hendrick said. “Therefore it is the recommendation of the Windmill Committee to the Board of Supervisors that the discussion of the future of utility-scale windmill projects be entertained and handled within a timely manner.”

Jennings, who presented the board with an 82-page packet of information on wind turbines, told the board he is even more strongly opposed to windmills than he was a month ago after doing research.

“My personal opinion is that wind energy development on Appalachian ridges carries great risk of environmental harm and very little potential for benefits,” Jennings sad. “Impact on birds and bats will be substantial. One bat would eat thousands of mosquitoes.”

Jennings said noise levels and the harm to real estate values are other reasons to think about prohibiting windmills.

“Loss of peaceful use of your land-studies have also shown livestock impacted by the turbines. There is lack of marketability of homes in the footprint of the turbines,” Jennings said. “Value losses up to two miles from the project range from 25 to 40 percent.”

Jennings said he is not fond of zoning or regulations. He feels that a person should be able to do whatever they wish on their own property with the exception of a quote he read from the Carroll County Comprehensive Plan.

“Zoning is intended to avoid disruptive land use patterns by preventing activities on one property from generating external effects that are detrimental to other properties.”

After hearing from citizens G.L. Quesenberry and Andy Jones, Dickson said he wanted to emphasize that the board wanted to have sufficient time to study windmills before making any decision. Martin said he is convinced there are not any good reasons to have windmills in Carroll County.

“The only reason it is feasible is because of government subsidies to put them in. I am just not in favor of it,” Martin said. “They won’t compete with Virginia Coal, they won’t compete even with oil. I just don’t see where it will do a whole lot nor is it practical.”

Neither Candidate is qualified to Decide our Energy Future

Romney prefers to stick his head in the sand and declare there is no such thing as global warming, leaving us with the assumption that our gluttonous energy consumption is just good business.

Obama on the other hand chose to ignore advice from his former chief of staff, Larry Summers, who explained that wind developers really had "no skin in the game." The wind developers are focusing upon reaping profits from grants and subsidies.

ENERGY CONSUMPTION IS NOT AN ISSUE TO BE DECIDED BY SELF-SERVING POLITICIANS who seek only the power bestowed by capturing your vote and the financial resources of those who game the system that allow them to do so.

Energy consumption is OUR problem and must be addressed by those who consume it. If every person on Earth consumed as much energy as US Citizens, it would require FIVE planets equivalent to Earth to support our gluttony.

We do have answers to help us conserve. We must insist on site-based programs like PACE (property assessed clean energy). Such programs do not rob from posterity like traditional grant programs, but provide funding by relying upon increased values of property improvements repaid over extended amortization schedules that make such improvements financially feasible for everyone.

With such initiatives we do not lose generated energy by transmitting it over the inefficient transmission grid and distribution network. In fact, we reduce our demand upon the "GRID."

Can you imagine how many jobs would be created by opening the flood gates of such massive financial resources as our individual personal property values? Installing systems for on site generation across our entire nation.

PLEASE THINK ABOUT IT!

Has the Wind Industry become a Hi-Tech Welfare Program?

As reported by:
http://www.windaction.org/opinions/35947

High-skilled, high-tech welfare

 We cannot evaluate the efficacy of federal spending programs by asking the recipients of federal largess whether they are happy with the money. Of course they are happy! The real issue is whether American taxpayers and electricity ratepayers should be happy.

September 4, 2012 by Bruce M. Everett in Cape Cod Times

In an Aug. 23 front-page column, Sean Gonsalves claims Cape Cod Community College's recent decision to install solar panels and wind turbines validates both the stimulus bill and the green energy jobs program. He is wrong on both counts.

Renewable energy is expensive. Onshore wind power costs at least three times as much as electricity produced from natural gas. Offshore wind costs six times more, and solar 10 times more. Renewables are forced into the marketplace by a complex web of federal and state subsidies that hide their true cost. The federal tax credits mentioned in the article are one subsidy; others include renewable energy standards, net metering, federal loans to manufacturers, production tax credits and local property tax relief, all of which disguise the true cost of renewable energy.

Cape Cod Community College has every right to seek federal and state support for its budget, but remember that the college is a public institution. The question is not whether the college saves money on solar energy but whether the public saves money. The renewable energy savings claimed by the college are an illusion. If we took $1 from every Cape Cod resident, we could buy the college a couple of S-class Mercedes cars. The college, the Mercedes factory in Alabama and the local car dealer might be thrilled with this arrangement, but the rest of us should object - and strongly.

We all understand that renewable energy subsidies provide jobs for people like Mr. Giles and his employees at Turning Mill Energy in Sandwich. We must remember, however, that the high costs of solar and wind energy are paid by someone else, and those lost dollars would have created jobs somewhere else in the economy.

We cannot evaluate the efficacy of federal spending programs by asking the recipients of federal largess whether they are happy with the money. Of course they are happy! The real issue is whether American taxpayers and electricity ratepayers should be happy. When the federal government is running deficits north of $1 trillion a year, Turning Mill Energy's federal tax credit has to be borrowed from China and paid back with interest by future generations.

I am happy for Mr. Giles and his colleagues, but they are enjoying a kind of high-skilled, high-tech welfare at our children's expense.

In its current form, renewable energy is simply too costly to make a meaningful contribution to our energy balance. After all the federal dollars and all the hype over the past four decades, wind energy accounts for 1 percent of U.S. energy use today, and the Department of Energy projects growth to only 2 percent by 2035. Solar accounts for 0.1 percent of our energy today and is expected to meet less than 0.5 percent in 2035. Research may yet produce technological breakthroughs, but subsidizing the current generation of technology impedes rather than facilitates progress. Why spend research dollars on improved technology, when you can sell the current inferior stuff at a profit?

The U.S. economy cannot grow by forcing high-cost energy into the marketplace. Those who produce this high-cost energy will gain, and the public will lose.

We have recently discovered in the U.S. vast new reserves of natural gas - a cheap, clean and efficient option. Massachusetts needs to tap into this low-cost, environmentally friendly option and forget about wind turbines, solar and - oh yeah - that monstrous dirty fuel oil power plant on the canal. If we do, we'll get lower taxes, lower electricity bills and more jobs.

Mr. Everett of Chatham teaches graduate-level energy economics at the Fletcher School at Tufts University.

Web link: http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article...